cafe yuka

it’s not fair… it’s just too cold here in saskatoon. it’s -27℃ with the windchill. it’s very unusual even in saskatchewan to be this cold this early. it’s colder than my freezer. i told my mom how cold it is, but it was more than her comprehension - life in a -27℃ world is impossible to her. my parents live in wakayama japan, where it’s around +13℃ this week. they think that’s cold… oh, well. SHO-GANAI ne.

since the outside world is depressing, i want to make my home life as cozy as possible!

so i made myself a cup of tea: rosehip tea with hibiscus flower (mmm, tropical!). i also made some rosehip tea cookies. i added rosehip loose tea leaves to the cookie dough. although they don’t taste anything like rosehip berries, it adds a touch of pretty pink color to the cookies. this happy color should make me happy.

the recipe is the same as my lavender cookies recipe except that i substitute rosehip loose tea leaves for the lavender flower buds. the recipe is here.

i slept most of the day yesterday, so i felt much better today. lucky enough, today was paul’s birthday.

i went to buy tiramisu at calories (a cafe & bakery), but they didn’t have any today. a woman suggested trifle instead saying they’re basically the same thing, but i wanted tiramisu. i gave her my asian smile to say “no, thank you” and i left.

as i was cooking dinner, i was in a bit of a panic-mode. it’s a birthday. you’re supposed to have a cake. but i’m not a baker myself. i don’t usually bake cakes so it seemed rather risky to bake a cake from scratch just two hours before paul’d be home.

then it hit me: “shu-kuri-mu! (chou cream)”

i remembered seeing a cooking show featuring “choux à la crème”. it looked very simple, like something i could make myself.

in french, it’s “choux à la crème”, but we drop the “à la” in japanese. it all comes down to how good it sounds. english teachers in japan used to make fun of their students saying “shoe cream”, but it’s actually “choux”, which means “cabbage”. i guess the pastry is cabbage-shaped? little cabbages are cute…

anyhow, i used to buy choux à la crème from cake shops in japan. they are very popular. most of the cake shops in japan sell french style sweets, which i like. i don’t see any choux à la crème in canada yet. probably you can buy them in montreal.

i wasn’t expecting a perfect result. because it always looks easy to produce perfect food on tv. but to my surprise, it was easy. all you have to be careful is to stir well!

i finished cooking 20 minutes before paul came home. i had some time left to make a birthday card. i made a card with both sides folded to the middle, like double doors. i cut out a heart shape from pink paper and attached it to the inside of the card with a spring. the heart was supposed to spring out! as he opened the card. unfortunately, the spring wasn’t powerful enough and the heart was too big. it just kind of hung there… that’s okay. i think he got the idea :D

recipe:

for puff pastry dough:

• unsalted butter 60g
• water 80cc
• sugar + salt, pinch
• flour 70g
• egg, 2~3

1. mix butter, water, sugar and salt in a pan and warm it until it comes to boil.
2. add the flour all at once and beat very vigorously. turn off the heat.
3. allow it to cool. then add the eggs one at the time. stir well.
4. put the dough in a piping bag (i just used a spoon), drop into small balls about 4 cm apart on a cookie sheet.
5. bake it in the oven for 15 mins at 200℃. and another 15 mins at 180℃. do not open the oven.

for custard cream:

• flour 50g
• sugar 80g
• milk 300cc
• egg yolk
• melted butter

1. mix egg yolk
2. add sugar and flour and TBSP of milk. stir well
3. add warm milk (about 50℃)
4. strain the mixture and pour it into a pan.
5. add the butter and let it cool.

fill the puff pastry with custard and fruits. i used blackberries and raspberries. sift some powdered sugar on top.

meshiagare! (bon appétit)

during the taisho period in japan, a popular song in the japanese opera was コロッケの唄(”song of korokke“), which goes like this: “korokke is an everyday dish, we eat korokke today and tomorrow. are we gonna eat korokke all year around?”. “korokke” is the japanese word for croquette, the popular french food that had just been introduced to japan. japan still has popular songs about new popular foods. the croquette boom is over, but japanese people still eat a lot of croquettes. you can find them in the grocery stores and convenience stores, and they’re often served as pub food in izakaya. everybody loves croquette.

as a kid, i was one of them. i used to take swimming lessons every saturday. afterwards, i would be starving, so my friends and i would go to a meat shop to buy croquettes. the butcher would fry up some croquettes for us. i think they were 50 yen each. so it didn’t hurt my small okozukai very much, but sometimes i had to debate in my head if i should spend my money on a croquette or save it to buy a cute pencil. the meat shop and the stationery shop were on the same block. well, you can’t fight with an empty stomach :)

i always liked croquettes, but i never made them myself until yesterday. i’d never had croquette in canada, and i don’t think i’d had one for at least six years. so i made it myself.

i then realized that i’m not such a big fan of croquettes anymore. the croquettes i made turned out pretty good and tasty, but after i ate one i realized croquette is just fried mashed potato with ground beef in it. i’m not a big fan of mashed potato, nor fried food, nor ground beef, either. hmm… at least i like onion.

anyway, the croquette wasn’t as tasty as i remembered. i guess you can never beat the food in your memory.

either that, or the butcher in my hometown just makes way better croquettes than me :D

i still enjoyed making the croquettes and serving them. i wrote paul’s name in japanese on them in ketchup. he was happy.

recipe

this is for 10 croquettes:

• 2 potatoes (medium)
• 100g ground beef
• half an onion, chopped
• nutmeg
• bay leaf
• flour, beaten egg, panko (japanese bread crumbs)
• vegetable oil
• s + p

sauce:

• ketchup + worchestershire sauce + red wine + grated garlic  (i just used ketchup)

how-to:

1. boil the potatoes with skins on.
2. saute the onion. when it turns transparent, add the beef, nutmeg and bay leaf.
3. when the potatoes are done, strain the hot water and mash them in a bowl. set aside.
4. when the beef mixture is ready, damp it onto paper towel to soak up the extra grease.
5. add the beef mixture to the mashed potato, mix lightly (do not overmix).
6. move the mixture onto a plate and cool in the fridge.
7. heat the vegetable oil in a pan. arrange the dipping station for flour, egg, and panko. i used tupperwares.
8. divide the cooled mixture and shape into balls and flatten them. make sure there are no cracks or it’ll explode in the oil. it’s better to wet your hand with some oil so the mixture won’t stick to your hands.
9. when the oil is heated to 170c (if you drop in some of the flour and water mixture and it drops to the bottom and comes back up, the oil is about 170c), dip the ball into flour, egg and panko. i use my right hand for dry ingredients and left for wet so that the panko doesn’t get stuck together with egg. that way, you can get a clean result.
10. turn them when they’re golden brown. cook both sides.
11. when fried, put them onto paper towl to soak up the extra oil.
12. serve them with cabbage and tomato. cabbage is supposed to help you digest greasy food. i like rice on the side.

enjoy! (or not so much…)

(click the images to view close up — slideshow)

obon has begun! obon is a buddhist festival held august 13-15, when our ancestors come back to visit us from the afterlife. obon is said to have begun in 606AD as a practice in the imperial court. it is only during the edo period that it spread through the rest of japanese society. during obon, everyone travels back to their family’s home to welcome their ancestors and to return their kindnesses. the night of the thirteenth, we light lanterns in front of the family altar or the gate to the house so that our ancestors won’t have trouble finding us.

we set up an additional table in front of the altar to offer food. the food offering varies from region to region. usually we offer seasonal flowers, vegetables, fruits and the ancestors’ favorite foods. but every family’s offering must include an eggplant and a cucumber. we make them into little animals, by inserting little wooden sticks for legs. the eggplant becomes a cow, and the cucumber becomes a horse. the idea is that our ancestors will ride the horse on their way to come see us and the cow when they go back home. so they come to see us as fast as they can and leave as slow as they can.

i was looking for italian eggplants that are similar in size to japanese ones (thin and short), but i couldn’t find any. so i bought chinese eggplants instead. so my cow is very fit and has 8 legs. petit cucumbers were available at superstore. so my horse looks damn cute.

of course, now we’re living in the 21st century. which means we are living in the future. i don’t think our cutting-edge ancestors will be happy just riding horses and cows. so i made a UFO out of a red onion to accomodate our future ancestors from space.

obon is a time for families to get together and have fun. we thank our ancestors for giving us our lives and the world today. we serve the same meals we eat as if we all eat together.

when i was little, i remember my grandma being very happy because my grandpa would come see us and hang out for a while. he died in his sixties (before my older brother was born), and my grandma never remarried. she would say, “i’m happy because he’s here with us.” she would talk to the buddhist tablet as if it were him about how well our family was doing and ask him to protect us. she was happy, so i was happy. i couldn’t see him but i knew he was there with us.

now my grandma has passed away. i’m happy that she will come see me and paul. i hope she can find us in canada. my obon dana (shelf) is missing a lot of buddhist items, but i don’t think she’d mind as long as we are all together.

finally, finally the day i’ve been waiting for has come… GOBO. i found a fine-looking GOBO (known in English as burdock) at eastern market here in saskatoon. i’ve previously found gobo in winnipeg, toronto and vancouver, but i was only visiting, so i didn’t get a chance to cook them. i hadn’t eaten gobo for a long time, so my love for gobo grew and grew. when i found one at the market last week, i almost exclaimed “GO~BO~” out loud, but i managed not to react. if i’d been with someone, i’d probably have been talking about the beauty of gobo for a long time. gobo is a magical vegetable — my favorite. it’s crunchy, tasty, fragrant, and full of fiber. i’m so happy to have found it here.

after living in canada for six years, i figured out a little trick to make sure i can eat japanese food while in canada. my trick is: find similar ingredients in different country’s cuisines.

for example:

• dutch bread is similar to japanese shoku-pan. (the portuguese introduced bread to japan in 1543)
• english mustard is the same as japanese mustard (maybe we copied the recipe?).
• pickling cucumbers are similar to japanese cucumbers.
• tahini is shirogoma paste.
• purple basil is aka-shiso.
• hoisin sauce is similar to okonomiyaki sauce.
• pomelo fruit is zabon.
• watercress is basically mizuna.
• etc, etc.

these connections make me happy. i find it more meaningful to be able to make japanese food using ingredients from other countries. as we eat together, the similarities between people are more apparent than the differences.

although my mom’s kinpira-gobo (burdock salad) is the best on earth, i did my best to cook it myself. finally my favorite wa-shoku (japanese cuisine) dish was on our dinner table. ：) we had pinot grigio in sake cups. we had a good laugh. i even got to use my little japanese bowls.

the dishes i made:

• top: steamed chicken breasts with mustard on blanched green beans
• top left: kinpira gobo (sweet soy sauce flavoured) with carrots, sesame seeds and thai red chili
• top right: horenso goma-ae ( boiled spinach with sesame)
• bottom left: takikomi gohan (flavoured rice with gobo, renkon, carrot, tofu and sliced green beans for garnish)
• bottom right: kakitama jiru (soup with egg and tofu and green onion for garnish)

my girlfriend mayu-chan makes delicious vegetarian wa-shoku. check it out! mayu-chan was kind enough to suggest sending gobo to me from toronto. i was very touched♥.

arigato mayu-chan.

i got some fresh rosemary from the farmers market last saturday. i remembered seeing a guy make a milky rosemary panna cotta on the food network one night. so i made my own last night, after midnight. that’s right, midnight cooking!

i was making obento for paul at the same time. usually people make obento in the morning, but i don’t like to rush (or get up early). i make a couple of small dishes so it takes some time.

cooking several things at once always makes me want to grow a couple of extra arms (like in this drawing). that way i could tackle multiple tasks at the same time. i could grow extra arms on my sides, but having extra arms on my back would be more helpful, because then i’d be able to cook up tamago-yaki on the stove while using my back arms to cut vegetables on the opposite counter. yes, my kitchen is that narrow.

speaking of extra arms, there are buddhist statues called senjyu-kan’non. “senjyu” means thousand hands. with some exceptions, usually senju-kan’non statues don’t have 1000 hands. they have 42 hands. the two hands praying are the true hands. the other 40 hands save 25 sufferings each, which makes 1000 hands. they’re beautiful. hands are special.

when i was little, a monk would come to my house to pray for my family’s ancestors. he was a very big old man with enormous earlobes and of course, a shaved head. he was a nice monk, but to me, at that time, he looked very strict and scary. for one thing, he was probably 6 feet tall and i was only 4 foot. my parents were both working, so usually my grandma and i were the only ones home. after prayers, my grandma would serve him a cup of tea. he’d bring some sweets and books to read for me. he would tell us some wise stories as well as a story about his son who was an american football player, a quarterback. he told us sadly that his son got severely injured during a game and was paralyzed. when he left, he would always pat my head with his big hand and give me cinnamon candies, which i hate. but i couldn’t say no.

rosemary panna cotta recipe

(for 4 small ramekins)

• 2 cups low-fat milk (or any milk or cream you like)
• one package gelatin (please follow the directions on the package)
• one stalk fresh rosemary
• 3 tsp sugar
• a dash of vanilla essence
• honey

warm 1 3/4 cups of milk in a milk pan. when it’s heated, add the rosemary and the sugar. in a different bowl, dissolve the gelatin in the remaining 1/4c of milk. add the dissolved gelatin to the warm milk. stir well and strain. pour into small dishes (ramekins) and chill. serve with honey.  enjoy ;)